Mobil to Build Beaumont Cyclohexane Plant

Mobil Chemical Company (MCC) announced on May 1 that it will build a 65-million-gallon-per-year grassroots cyclohexane facility at its petrochemicals complex in Beaumont, TX.

The project will upgrade part of the Beaumont plant's existing benzene and hydrogen supply to cyclohexane, an intermediate chemical used primarily to make nylon fibers and resins. The plant will use IFP technology, which has been used in more than 80% of new cyclohexane capacity installed worldwide over the last three decades.

The new complex, which is expected to come on-stream in the third quarter of 1999, will result in Mobil Chemical becoming the world's third largest manufacturer of cyclohexane with annual production of about 130 million gallons.

The company also makes about 65 million gallons of cyclohexane annually at a similar plant in Singapore.    

Cyclohexane is used primarily to make nylon fiber for the carpeting and apparel markets or nylon resin used in automotive parts, films and coatings, cable, electronic parts and tubing industries.

MCC is an integrated manufacturer and marketer of basic petrochemicals, synthetic lubricant basestocks, additives for fuels and lubricants, oriented polypropylene packaging films and zeolite catalysts. It operates manufacturing and research facilities in 10 countries.

In Beaumont, MCC manufactures ethylene, polyethylene, propylene, benzene, toluene, paraxylene, synthetic lube base stocks, lubricant additives and zeolite catalysts.